


Devotedly, Yours

by minxiebutt



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Religious, Falling In Love, Fluff without Plot, M/M, bible scholar Levi, priest erwin, religion without homophobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-07
Updated: 2019-02-07
Packaged: 2019-10-24 01:40:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17695190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/minxiebutt/pseuds/minxiebutt
Summary: Levi studies scripture under Erwin's tutelage. They fall in love.





	Devotedly, Yours

 

Levi Ackerman gives a last, backward glance at the church that has served as his home for half of his life, since he was twelve years old. He has spent every day at this church, living in the boarding hall, attending the school behind it and then teaching at that same school. He’s done all he can here, and with a verbose recommendation from his superiors, he’s leaving for a city he’s never been to, armed with a small backpack of personal possessions and a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to study under Father Smith. 

The priest has an otherworldly understanding of scripture, and Levi hopes that he can be affected by that otherworldliness. 

-

Father Smith is handsome. It’s a thought that springs into Levi’s mind with a tainting of shame, so he tries to avoid even looking at the man unless it’s absolutely necessary. If his own eye causes him to sin, it would be better to pluck it out. But Levi has self-control. 

He has self-control but he spends so many waking hours in the company of Erwin, listening and learning. Even when he reads, he has only to lift his head and find the priest right there waiting to answer questions or speak over the text. 

The priest’s office at the university is toward the front of the building, so many students drop in unannounced at any given time, much to Levi’s relief. The alone time makes his eyes wander from print words to written words to fingers grasping a pen, because there is a small sticker of a rainbow flag on the office door--

“This is our newest scholar,” Erwin says with a fond and gentle smile, extending a hand toward Levi, who sits in an armchair in the corner. 

One thing that startles Levi and takes some getting used to, is that Erwin respects his boundaries with room to spare. He never shares Levi’s name, instead allows Levi the decision of introducing himself. More often than not, Levi only gives a polite smile and nod of acknowledgement, returning his eyes to his work quickly, before they stray to a blonde crown.

Angels must have sunshine hair, he always believed as a child. His own hair is black like night and sin, that’s why God punished him so thoroughly from such a young age. He finds these kinds of thoughts returning too much lately. He’s only been here a few days.  _ There’s a rainbow flag on the door, _ but it shouldn’t matter to him. He’s here to study, not find a husband. 

“Shall I bring you something from the cafeteria?” Erwin reaches over to rest the tips of his fingers on Levi’s desk. It’s not quite a breach of personal space but a prodding at the gates, a seeking.

Levi studies the fingertips without meaning to. The hands are clean, nails trimmed. Interestingly, there are callouses, and Levi wonders what the priest must do to obtain and maintain the roughened skin there. Levi’s own fingers are soft enough to invite papercuts.

“Sure,” he finally answers, looking back down from the fingertips to the translated Greek texts without letting his eyes wander to Erwin’s, but as soon as the priest rises to leave, Levi watches him go without meaning to.

-

They eat in Erwin’s office together, sitting on the sofa side by side with their meals laid out on the small coffee table. Being so close, the differences in their stature in obvious. Levi’s legs are so much shorter, his knees measuring only part way down Erwin’s thighs, the diameter of his limb nearly half as well. What part of the man is safe to look at? All Levi’s treacherous thoughts do wander.

-

Lecture days are a relief. Levi sits in the back of the hall, letting Erwin’s steady and sure voice come in and out of his consciousness. He takes notes even though this is material that he’s already learned, but having Erwin’s take on these topics are refreshing. 

When lectures are over for that particular day, Erwin comes to the back of the hall to retrieve a lost-in-thought Levi, breaking him from the prison of his mind with an amused-sounding, “Did I bore you so much?”

Levi looks up at Erwin’s face, at his gentle smile and friendly posture, and only shakes his head as he swallows. He begins to gather up his things when Erwin takes the seat next to him. He asks Levi’s thoughts on his lecture, not just on the scriptures and the interpretations, but also on the deliverances of his words.

“Religious courses are not mandatory,” Erwin explains. “Many of my students choose to  enrich their curriculum, and many are lost and looking for truth.”

“What better place to find truth than at university?” Levi tries to sound easy, but his question comes out a little too awkwardly forceful, like he’s demanding a proper answer.

But somehow, the Father Smith understands his meaning. “Exactly,” he says in that gentle way of his. Gone is the confidently projected voice that he’s been speaking with. In fact, Levi’s noticed the difference in Erwin’s tones. With students, he is so commanding, but when it’s just the two of them, his voice is much softer.

“Why did you decide to teach here?” Levi asks. It’s a question that’s been nagging him, how a great priest like Erwin ended up at a secular university, when plenty of Bible colleges would have taken him. Levi doesn’t think it has to do with money. In such a short time with the man, Levi has come to the conclusion that worldly materials are not of interest to him; he has nothing flashy or expensive, and Levi pretends not to see him paying for students’ meals in the rare time that Levi ventures down to the cafeteria with him. 

Father Smith does something Levi’s never seen. Slowly, a sadness creeps into his expression, but he’s quick to chase it away with upturned lips.

“I believe God’s place for me is here,” he answers at last.

-

Levi’s tiny dorm is right beside the library building, so he finds himself there on late nights when his thoughts are too unholy for him to be left alone with. He reads not religious texts in those times, his mind too clouded with guilt to think about how he must disappoint God with his fleshly desires, but seeks the eternally intriguing anthropology books instead. He misses his home.

As the homesickness grows stronger, Levi spends almost every night at this table with a single lamp lit. Tonight, though, he doesn’t read. He lays his head on his folded arms and prays until his eyes prickle with hot, repentant tears.

It’s just the night, he knows. The devil comes to him at night, when the sun has set and the moon keeps watch. The darkness invites sin, and try as he might to avoid it, he is weak. Whatever it is that he feels for Father Smith, he needs to suppress it before it grows into something unforgivable. There are no reasons for him to imagine soft stolen kisses or too-tight embraces in the moonlight. 

“Levi.”

He raises his head to furiously wipe at his face, too upset to be embarrassed. In this moment, he is soft-skinned and vulnerable, and Erwin must recognise that immediately, because he steps close and lays a hand on a shaking shoulder.

“Are you alright?”

Levi nods, using his sleeve to chase away remnants of evidence. “Yeah,” he croaks. “Yeah, sorry, I just… I just came down here to…”

His voice trails off when he realises that Erwin is touching him, though they’ve never touched before outside of their introductory handshake. The warmth of the hand on his shoulder soaks through his jacket and sweatshirt.

“It’s going to be alright,” Erwin promises him. He sounds so confident in that, that Levi nods and gathers himself up to go back to bed. The library must be close to closing now, judging by the hour--

“What are you doing here?” Levi asks suddenly. 

“Looking for you.” Erwin’s hand falls from Levi’s shoulder when the noirette rises. No explanation comes voluntarily, and though Levi isn’t sure he wants to ask, he musters up the courage to do it anyway.

Quietly, like trespassing, he asks, “Why?”

Erwin’s voice doesn’t falter, a steadfast confession without fear or shame, “You were on my heart.” 

-

Levi compares translations of one gospel for a week. He writes up a thick, fifty-page paper that he presents to Erwin late on a Friday afternoon, after lectures are finished for the day, nervousness overtaking him. He’s drawn probably a little too much inspiration from Erwin’s similar works. 

“I’m looking forward to reading this.” Erwin doesn’t peek between the stapled sheets, which makes Levi all the more nervous. “Will you join me for service on Sunday?”

The inquiry is the distraction Levi needs from his bubbly stomach, so he nods with enthusiasm, more than necessary. “Where do you attend?”

-

Levi sits beside the priest at service. They share a hymnal and Levi sings quietly so that he can hear Erwin’s surprisingly pleasant voice as they worship. Afterward, Erwin grasps his shoulder and thanks him for coming.

He can’t help it, and he hopes it’s not written on his face, how flushed he feels having that large hand on him. Maybe it doesn’t show, because Erwin says, “There’s coffee. Come and meet the congregation, this is your home now.”

Levi nods and follows.

-

“Do you play?” Erwin asks after coffee wanes and many have gone home for lunch. Levi had escaped the social hour and found a piano tucked into a side room. It’s an older upright, the metal inscription plate telling him that it was the church’s first piano many, many years ago. It’s older than himself and Erwin combined.

“I learned at school.” Levi slides back the cover to expose the black and white keys, though he doesn’t touch any.

Erwin sits beside him on the piano bench, and their bodies brush as he situates himself. “Can you play ‘At the Cross’?”

“Yes,” Levi answers quickly. “That was actually the first hymn I learned.”

“Would you like to have a duet?” Erwin leans in to ask, bumping his shoulder against Levi’s. 

Unsure fingers hover over the keys, before arranging themselves appropriately and moving along with muscle memory. There’s something sinfully intimate about sharing this together, sharing this with Erwin, how is there sin in this innocent duet? But as they sit side by side and praise God, Levi can’t help but feel he must repent for this later. By the time they finish and Levi slides the cover back over the piano keys, he knows he blushes all the way down his chest and up to his ears. 

-

Levi pays attention to the way Erwin’s hands are reserved with everyone else. Even that little bit of contact between them, the grasping of shoulders or the playful bumping, looks like a mountain compared to the valley of Father Smith’s touch with others.

It starts as touches, after the duet. Nothing that can’t be considered plain and friendly in the eyes of most, but Levi spends so much time with Erwin, and knows how Erwin handles himself around others, so he lets himself get carried away in the implications.

“God created us to need affection,” Erwin had said in one lecture when a student asked for clarifications about chastity and purity, where things like holding hands and hugging sat in God’s eyes. “It is not a sin to embrace your brothers and sisters, but instead it is a sin to look upon them with lust in your heart. Physical touch is a love language, and we should not do harm to those who need it, by withholding it.”

Levi taps his pen against the page of his notes, trying to calm this thoughts. He’s supposed to be interpreting the ten commandments for a modern day world, but his mind is caught in the realisation that Erwin must show love through touch and he gives Levi little brushes throughout the day. Their hands, for the first time this morning. Passing a pen, such a boringly mundane thing, made gooseflesh of Levi because when Erwin took the proffered writing utensil, he’d let his fingers wrap around Levi’s hand before sliding upward to take the pen with a pleasant, “Thank you.”

Levi is soiling this innocent affection with his impure thoughts. Even when he tries to imagine himself in hell fire, it makes his face burn all the hotter. He knows he shouldn’t, but he entertains thoughts of Erwin’s hands on him, on his neck, in his mouth, in other places that he won’t let himself name. 

Naturally, spending so many hours together would inspire this fondness, but fondness is too weak of a word for Levi right now.

-

Erwin takes his hand when they are reading in the library one late night. A proper grasping hold, Erwin’s large fingers wrapped securely around Levi’s smaller ones, his thumb brushing over Levi’s wrist several times before he squeezes. He priest says, “I really enjoyed your comparison of translations and their nuances. Would you like to write another?”

When he gets over his shock, Levi squeezes back and nods.

-

Levi never knew such pleasure could come from hands. Belatedly, he thinks that maybe the inquiring student had been right to bring up the question.

They’ve taken to hand holding in quiet hours when no one but God witnesses. 

But today… when Erwin takes Levi’s hand as they sit side by side on the small sofa to eat a quick lunch, he doesn’t just wrap his fingers around Levi’s; no, he presses the tips between Levi’s, skating over the sensitive webbing where they sprout to lace their digits. It spurs a hot bolt in Levi’s gut that makes his stomach muscles tighten. Like this, he can feel the priest’s callouses pressing into the back of his hand when he squeezes, a movement that makes Levi want to gasp. 

“I’m sorry,” Erwin begins when Levi lets out a small, strained sound, but Levi stops him by bringing their union to his mouth and laying a kiss where they join. Erwin’s hand is dusted with fine blonde, it tickles at his cheek. 

“Don’t be,” Levi forgives easily. Everything with Erwin is easy. 

Blue eyes catch his as he lowers their hands. They stare at one another, reading, believing, until Levi has to slide his eyes away to keep his thoughts pure. It’s not a sin to love one’s brethren or to embrace one’s brethren, and Levi understands in that moment that he is beginning to love Erwin after two months studying at his side. 

Something about this new knowledge quells the heated thoughts, and Levi finds himself focusing better on the scripture, anchored to Erwin’s steadying presence by that revelation.

-

Autumn becomes winter, and Levi is a southerner, he’s not prepared for the true form of the season. He wears two sweaters over his button downs, then a jacket over those, but he still needs to take a blanket to the library to lay over his lap to keep his legs warm. Of course, Erwin is layering, too, but he’s not the one curled up in the office armchair and practically shivering.

“I can hear your teeth chatter from over here,” Erwin jokes one afternoon. Sunlight spills in, and though Levi is lounging in those warm rays as he annotates the edits he needs to make in the rough outline of his paper, he must fight the desire to curl into himself. The lecture hall was drafty this morning, it put him in a sleepy mood.

“Very funny,” Levi looks up from his marks to find Erwin is turned all the way around, looking at him with hearts in his eyes. His own heart thumps, and he swallows, hiding his earnest response behind a coy, “What?”

Father Smith has the sort of confidence and self-esteem that Levi’s always lacked, so Levi is equally surprised and unsurprised when the priest gives an immediate, honest answer. “I was thinking about how much I would like to court you, Levi.” 

They’ve known one another for four months, and Levi has known he loves Erwin for two of those. To hear these words from the one he holds affection for brings a blush to his cheeks. Looking away, Levi murmurs, “Took you long enough.”

Laughter begins to bubble up out of Erwin, and the sound draws Levi’s eyes back to him, his own mouth cracking into a smile and eventually spilling out quiet chuckling. They look at one another with happiness between them, something sweet and pure and promising. 

Erwin rises, and then comes to kneel on the floor beside the armchair. He takes Levi’s hand in one of his own and then rests the other on top, and he looks up at Levi with all the world’s hope. “Levi,” he whispers, blue intent on burning grey. There’s intimacy in this moment, something too hot to touch yet, but something that they will soon become able to grasp between them. “May I court you?”

“You may,” Levi grants. It’s always easy with Erwin. 

Burning blues crinkle in the corners with the huge smile that erupts, and then Erwin is leaning forward to kiss Levi’s hand before twining their fingers. Levi’s slot between Erwin’s, curling down as Erwin’s reciprocate. They will be one; soon, they will graft into one holy flesh, the marriage bed undefiled. Levi does not think these things in lust anymore, but instead in patient anticipation. 

“You make me so happy, Levi,” Erwin confesses into their union before he leans his forehead to touch where his lips just left. It’s a little of an awkward position, but Levi bends down sideways to rest his cheek on the blonde crown.

-

“When does a marriage begin?” Erwin opens his lecture for the day with this question. In the rafters of the hall, Levi watches intently, not needing to take notes this time. He and Erwin structured this lesson together. 

A student looks around at their peers before bravely raising their hand, answering uncertainly when Erwin nods at them, “At the ceremony?”

“That’s one beginning,” Erwin agrees. “How else?”

Several students begin to trade looks and raise their hands. The expected answers revolve around the legal proof of marriage or the religious ceremonies, and Erwin throws a curve ball at his students by asking them, “Is it possible for a marriage to begin without a ceremony or licence?”

“Like common law?” One student blurts. 

“Sure.” Erwin paces over to the whiteboard. “Does God honour a union made between two people in their hearts, when vows are made without a ceremony?”

Levi smiles to himself at the confusion that scatters around the room. He catches Erwin’s eye and the priest gives him a secretive, knowing grin. They were at the courthouse yesterday, spent the night consummating their relationship. Memories make him blush.

-

Never in his life did Levi imagine that God made man capable of feeling such intense pleasure. He remembers the few times he touched himself and how the guilt clouded the satisfaction like a thunderstorm covers the sun, but this, here,  _ with Erwin— _ it is free of any shame and it is so consumingly  _ good _ . 

Levi lets his head lull back and happily moans at the bites marking the exposed skin of his throat as he sinks down, bringing his husband into his body, joining them together. He’d come back to Erwin’s office from a late night at the library and had been greeted with, “Lock the door, my love.”

They’re only newlywed for a few weeks, they can hardly keep their hands off one another during daylight hours, can almost never wait to get home before they’re undressing and seeking out beckoning heat, taking it right there in the office like desperate men. Levi doesn’t swear lightly, but he can’t help to think of this as anything other than a filthy fuck because Erwin is  _ filthy _ . 

Experimentally, he wiggles his hips in a shimmy, earning a strained groan from the man beneath him. Erwin buries his face in his bosom and Levi wraps his arms around his head as he does his best to form a rhythm. 

-

There’s a tiny table at the back of the cafeteria with two chairs opposite, and Levi takes to having dinner with Erwin there on the days he ventures down. Their clasped hands are on display while they eat, matching gold bands glimmering in the early spring sunset. 

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> i don't really write much fluff, so this was a good attempt, i think. thank you for reading.


End file.
